


Z-Day

by dragonfire12



Category: Horror - Fandom, Original Work, zombie - Fandom
Genre: Daughter Dies, Explicit Language, Guns, Other, Survival Horror, Violence, Zombies, father - Freeform, friends - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-16
Updated: 2016-02-16
Packaged: 2018-05-21 02:21:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6034411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragonfire12/pseuds/dragonfire12
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Hello, I am posting a writing piece for my friend and he says that he knows that the first few paragraphs really, really suck, specifically the first paragraph as it was required as part of an assignment for a creative writing class. This is not my original work and he has given me permission to post on here! If you have any questions, I will act as an owl and deliver them to him.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Z-Day

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, I am posting a writing piece for my friend and he says that he knows that the first few paragraphs really, really suck, specifically the first paragraph as it was required as part of an assignment for a creative writing class. This is not my original work and he has given me permission to post on here! If you have any questions, I will act as an owl and deliver them to him.

She has been in the room for a week now; she has been locked in there. She isn’t herself anymore. It was only a few days before that the outbreak happened. She had come home that day with a bite mark on her left arm. I should have known better. She told me how some bum in an alley had run at her and bit down on her arm. I should have realized. But instead I asked her why she was in an alley to begin with. I wasn’t thinking. When she told me that she wasn’t, that’s when I should have been positive of what had happened, but I was too oblivious. Then the next morning I woke up to her screaming a ghastly, blood curdling sound. Then I knew what I had missed. So I locked her in her room, no food, no water, she didn’t need it anymore. 

I ran downstairs, her being completely confined in her room, with key in hand to my safe. I grabbed everything I knew I would need and threw it into a large duffel bag and special case. I walked slowly and silently back up the stairs making sure to check each and every corner and constantly checking my back. I moved back up to the second floor where she was still locked in her room. As I moved up the stairs I could hear her smashing against the door. Each thud reverberating inside me, freezing me for a moment with every hit as the fear rushed through my body, wondering whether or not she would break through the barricade I had constructed, and if so then how long would it hold? As I reached the top of the stairs I could see a large crack in the door and a small hole inside the crack through which she pulled and ripped out small chunks of wood, only taking breaks to look through and snarl and growl at me.

I slowly backed up into my room, making sure to never take my eyes off her for more than a second. As I entered my room I quickly shut the door and locked it, just in case she got out. It seems so pointless now, I was only in the room for a few moments, much longer than it would have taken for her to break through the door or another to get into the house then find me, let alone attempt to climb the stairs. I grabbed the backpack I was looking for, a hiking backpack that I leave on my chair. I quickly ran through my mind whether or not to bring clothes, deciding I would most likely steal new clothes from abandoned stores every day or so to remove some of my scent. I didn’t realize then how often it would happen or how soon I would learn my lesson. I slowly unlocked my door and peered out, she was still confined by what was left of her door and the barricade. She had opened the hole enough, though, to get her head or an arm out and as she saw me leave my bedroom she reached out towards me, as though her arm could stretch out another ten feet, in an attempt to grab me. Seeing this I could only think about how deeply I wished to hold her again, to be with her once more, but it soon passed as she growled at me through the hole.

I slowly crept back down to the ground floor to search of supplies I would need. I first raided the pantry where I kept many canned soups and other foods, I jammed as much as I thought I had room for. Then I went into the bathroom where I kept a small first aid kit, just a few Band-Aids, some gauss, some needles, and some pills, aspirin mostly. Next I moved on to a few other items I thought I would need, a butane lighter, matches, survival knife, two flashlights, and a machete. Lastly on to the conveniences, knives, forks, a portable game system, a deck of cards, and my cell phone, hopefully it would work. 

As I begin to look around for anything I might have missed I heard a thud against my back door. I quickly turned around as it was a glass door in the kitchen where I was standing. I saw my neighbor standing at the door, staring at me.

“Jesus Christ Jim,” I said, “you damn near gave me a heart attack. Look man there’s something going on right now and we need to get out of here before either of us…”  
My voice trailed off as I got a closer look at Jim, his hands were painted red, as was his face, his eyes were extremely blood shot with grayed pupils and irises, and he stood there like there was no one there, his jaw just dangling. I stared for a moment, then slowly started for the door to my left, it was twenty feet away, I was confident he wouldn’t be able to break through the glass and get to me by then or that he would be able to reason that he could go around the house. I was right, well half right anyway. As soon as I started moving away Jim screamed and hammered at the glass, it broke in seconds. I had just started running to the door, I had another ten feet to clear then open the door. It may have only been ten feet but it was the farthest ten feet of my life, it seemed to take over a minute to reach the door, and Jim moved very fast. As I twisted the knob I heard him at the last ten feet, it might have been five. As I ripped open the door I could feel him right behind me reaching. I jumped through the door way and slammed the door shut just as his fingertips grazed my shoulder.

I was in my garage, no one here but me, I was finally out of danger, no, scratch that, I was still in danger and I knew that, I knew I always would be. I first looked outside through the window in the side door, nothing, I was in the clear for now. I could still hear the banging of the door as Jim desperately tried to get to me. I already had the garage door opened and my car started, by the time he got in I was already gone. 

I knew where I had to go, my friend Dakota’s house, I also knew how to get there without all the traffic. Along the way I listened to every news station I could find, all of them talking about the violent incidents occurring on the streets, of all the deaths and arrests being made. They never mentioned all the people that knew what was happening that were fleeing the city.  
As I approached the house I noticed silence, that was good, they hadn’t gotten here yet. Then I realized that might mean he wasn’t here either, that would be bad. I thought for a moment, should I go in, no I might have to break in creating noise, I wouldn’t want that. Maybe I should yell for him, no that’s even worse, it would be much easier to hear. Then I remembered I had my phone, obviously the lines of communication were still up, I went through my contacts list and found his name. I clicked send. The ringing seemed too long, I almost went in. Then I heard his voice, “hello?”  
“Oh thank god your still alive dude,” I replied, “Where are you, I’m at yur house, are you in there? Please tell me you haven’t left yet!”  
“Yea I’m still here why wouldn’t I be, are you on crack or somethin?”  
“No, dude its finally happening man, the day we’ve been planning for, I’m comin in we need to grab everything we can and get everybody together, now!”  
“Alright, well hurry up and get in here so we can get the hell outta here and grab the others.”  
We spent the next thirty minutes gathering everything we could and throwing it into the trunk of my car. Now, we just had to get to everyone else before they did.  
A silence consumed the car, broken after nearly fifteen minutes.  
“Hey, um, where’s Sarah?” asked Dakota, even though he already knew the answer.  
“Where do you think she is? She’s gone.”  
“Yea, I figured, but I had to ask.”  
“No… you could’ve said anything else.”  
“No, I couldn’t. Even though I knew the answer I still had to ask, and you know why I had to. Did u at least end it?”  
I sniffled, “no. And after everything we started I just couldn’t do it.”  
By now a few stragglers had wandered away from the city as they noticed the cars and few people running away from the horror. Three were standing in the middle of the road, arms stretched out reaching for everything that passed. Two reached out to us, the other had its back turned looking at a car coming towards it in the distance. The gas pedal was slammed to the floor and the car jerked forward.

“Woooooooooo!!! Yea son, take ‘em OUT!!”  
As the car sped towards the infected, the third, oblivious, infected, turned around just in time to see a dark grey 2005 Pontiac Grand Prix slam into the lower bodies of the two standing beside her. The infected next to her was hit in waist and sent catapulting twenty feet over the car, his feet still on the ground. The man next to him was hit in his right side, sending him spiraling to the left.  
“God damn man, u completely fucked that middle one up.”  
“He better be dead! Or I’ll hit him again and again.”  
“Nah, you got ’em. Great way to take out anger eh?”  
Dakota turned to me but no response was given and he left it at that.  
We approached the outer limits of the city, very little infection. They were more than likely feasting in the busier city streets. Lucky for us, most of the friends were located in the less populated areas of the city, but there were a few to worry about. We’d need the others first though.  
Our first stop was Kevin, a friend to the both of us from first grade. He lived with his girlfriend on the outskirts of town. We took Door Road to Eager and then a few other back roads to get to 4849 Sumach Avenue. We encountered little resistance, a few off to the side, some in the streets. I drove too fast for them to catch us though, and I hit the ones in our way.  
Upon approach of the house I couldn’t help but think about Amber’s fear. Either she knew what had happened and had gotten them both out of the city or she got Kevin to reinforce the house. We were glad to find the later to be true. 

“Damnit, I hope they’re still in there.”  
“Well why wouldn’t they be, oh right you said amber’s a bit of a zombie freak.”  
“Yea, and if she got Kevin outta here we might be a little screwed if we wait too long.”  
“Ok so get out of the car, grab one of the guns and let’s get movin before we get surrounded.”  
“Alright.”  
I opened the trunk. Dakota grabbed a twelve gage pump action hunting shotgun. I reached for my colt .45 handgun and a scoped twenty-two hunting rifle. We each grabbed a handful of ammo. I grabbed a few, preloaded, clips for each gun, while Dakota grabbed dozens of shotgun shells; we stuffed them into our pockets.  
As we approached the door I stood at our backs watching for wandering infected.  
“So do you really think they left?”  
“I don’t know, Kevin told me she was a bit of a zombie survival plan nut. Don’t worry about it and keep watching our ass.”  
But I couldn’t stop worrying about it; too much had gone wrong already. We were at the door on the front porch. A broken glass table and wooden chair lay on the ground. The table had been shattered into a thousand tiny little pieces that lay strewn across the porch and parts of the lawn. Every step was made uncomfortably loud by the crunching of glass beneath our sneakers. The legs had been snapped off on the chair and lay only a few yards away on the grass. The short stubs where the legs used to be were spattered with blood, with claw marks on the bottom. We both stared at it, the same scenario running through our minds. Someone big wielding the chair to fend off infected as they tried to get in or out of the house. The first to get too close received a blow to the head, snapping off the legs, and fell onto the glass table. From there the chair was used as a shield to keep distance as the infected tried to claw it away, it would seem as though they succeeded. The only odd thing was the absence of bodies. We had lost focus and quickly regained our composure.

We checked our surroundings before opening the door; we had to make sure nothing was sneaking up on us while we had daydreamed. We were lucky the infected that had already noticed us were still on the other side of the street, we had sufficient time. Dakota knocked on the door so as not to run into any friendly fire by opening it. Fearing the lack of the gun in either hand, Dakota smacked the butt of the shotgun against the wooden door.  
“Damnit dude, not so loud yur gunna alert anything that’s hungry to where we are. Is that what u want?!”  
“Shut up alright, even if it did alert anyth… shh. Did u hear that?”  
“No you were talking to loud; it’s probably something u just invited to dinner. You happy now?!”  
“No it wasn’t one of them it sounded more like a soft shriek. I think it came from the garage.”  
“Dude u better be sure about this cuz I am not gunna let myself get eaten on a hunch, I will leave you behind if u get us attacked.”  
“Just trust me.”  
I followed Dakota over to the garage door, we would never go into the house to get to the garage, it was too dangerous. Again I covered our backs while Dakota kept to the front, approaching the middle of the aluminum sliding door. Again Dakota knocked on the door. The sound resonated throughout the neighborhood, the sound of the metal being struck echoed, as did the moans of the infected.  
Dakota yelled at the door, “Kevin, it’s me Dakota, c’mon we’ve got a plan, just let us in for a sec.”  
No reply.  
“Damnit Kev, let us in, c’mon we got a slight horde out here comin after us now, we’re not infected, just let us in!”  
By now the infected were nearly at the car, we would have to run and find a place to hide until they cleared away. We aimed at the first two infected to clear our path to safety, if there was such a thing. They were the two closest to the wall of the garage; they were about two feet away. But if they were removed there would be about a seven foot wide gap between the wall and the next closest infected. 

We quickly took aim and pulled the trigger. In the blink of an eye we had aimed our guns, they were already at shoulder height from watching the horde approach, and pulled the trigger. Both clean hits, the twenty-two round shot through the infected’s skull right through its right eye, the shotgun shell cleared away the left half of the others’ face. They fell to the ground simultaneously. Somehow we had managed to aim at and kill the correct targets at the same time without so much as looking at each other.  
We had begun to lower our guns and run when the garage door opened a crack, just enough for a body to roll through. We glanced at each other, looked down, and fell. We slid our guns under, grabbed the bottom of the door, and pulled ourselves in. We rolled back as the door was slammed shut behind us. Kevin was there standing above us, a mix of fear, relief, and exhaustion on his face.  
I stuck my arm out, beckoning for him to help us up, “little help here buddy?”But he didn’t reach back. He lowered his arms to his sides and just stood there staring at us. I looked to Dakota; he looked back at me with the same befuddlement on his face. We got ourselves up off the cold concrete. The entire garage had been boarded up. Windows had ten to twelve 2x4’s drilled over them and the door into the house had a giant red tool box wedged against it. All along the walls were racks of tools, gardening equipment, and other junk. Rags and old car parts littered the floor. Half of the garage was taken up by Kevin’s old red camaro. The other half had weapons, food, sleeping blankets, a small moveable toolbox, and a rolling tray table with car parts and tools.  
“Hey thanks for that Kev, for a sec I thought u were gunna leave us, we were about to run the hell outta there too.”  
“Yea that was close man.”  
Kevin didn’t answer. “Kevin? U ok man?”  
Much to our surprise Kevin grabbed us both and squeezed. We were caught off guard and completely surprised. We had never seen Kevin break down and cry before, let alone hug anyone that wasn’t family or female.  
“I thought you were all fucking dead. I didn’t think anyone else was going to make it out alive.”  
Dakota and I thought the same thing, but I said it first, “Kevin we’ve been known as the three musketeers since first grade, how could you ever think we wouldn’t be the same when the world came to an end?”  
We stood still for a few minutes watching as Kevin stopped crying and wiped the tears from his eyes.  
It was Dakota that broke the silence, “wait, where’s Amber?”  
We looked around the small room like there would be some lump we missed or an eyeball staring out of a closet, there wasn’t. Then Kevin pointed behind himself, to the backseat of his camaro. We crept up to the side window, our guns still in hand; we were ready to do what Kevin couldn’t. There she was, on the other side of the car, staring out the window into the wall, chewing on her fingers.

“K, ready?”  
“Yea … wait.”  
“What?”  
“She doesn’t look infected.”  
Kevin spun around and faced us, “What!? U thought she was bitten?! Were u gunna shoot her!?”  
“Well, not yet, we didn’t know if she was clean or not, she’s locked in the car”  
“She’s in there cuz it made her feel safer!”  
“WHAT!? You were going to SHOOT me?!” she yelled from behind the glass and steel.  
“Wow, bad start, eh Dakota?”  
“Yea, let’s forget this ever happened.”  
A thud at the garage door quieted the conversation. Every second it banged again.  
“Should we open it, it could be someone trying to escape.”  
We waited a moment to decide, then we heard the moan. We all stood perfectly still not making a sound. We were frozen; no muscle in our whole body would so much as twitch. The thudding continued. Our eyes widened in fear. Our hearts raced in our chests, we could hear each other’s hearts beating against our ribs. Only when the knock came would our hearts cease to move, the quiet was more frightening than when they beat. We were all worried of what would happen if it didn’t stop, our faces betrayed our thoughts. Footsteps. Slow, pounding, and dragging feet approached the walls. Adrenalin coursed through our veins. We were still frozen, however Kevin and I began to shake, violently. At first I thought I was having a seizure, but then realized we were still conscious and standing.  
We stood there for what seemed like hours listening to the horrors outside slamming themselves against the door and walls. Then it stopped. The adrenalin really kicked in, we jumped to the ready, our guns to our shoulders looking like a couple of wannabe S.W.A.T. officers. The silence put us on edge; we steeled our barrels towards the door. Kevin rummaged through his junk for something to use, despite the gun pile next to him. We stood there aiming at the door waiting for the door to lift or burst open. We waited for ten minutes, nothing happened, there was only silence, they left.

I broke the silence, “Ok we need to get out of here now before they come back with more friends cuz people are dropping like flies out there.”  
“Alright, well then u two help us pack our stuff up and we’ll stay behind you ok? You did drive here right?”  
“Of course we drove, what would ever make u think we could walk thru this? And yea we’ll help.”  
It was easy, everything was already there. We bagged some food, clothes, and other necessities. The guns and ammo we threw into the trunk of the camaro. The bagged supplies and anything else we thought we would need were thrown into the backseat where Amber had been. The only other thing to go into the trunk was the small toolbox, which was only small in comparison to the large toolbox holding the door which was too big for the backseat. Kevin grabbed two guns to keep up front with him, a shotgun he put on the dashboard and a pistol he wedged between the front seats. Why did it seem like I was the only one to favor a rifle over a shotgun? Kevin and amber got into the car as Dakota and I began to open the garage door. Only as it began to open did something occur to me.  
“Wait! We heard them come and stop but we never heard them walk away!”  
“Oh shit!”  
As we reversed the direction of the heavy door a gnarled, rotting, hand snatched the bottom of the door, with it, five more followed. We pushed with all of our strength, leaning against the door for extra force. Still, the door slowly rose. By now a few pale, bloody, arms squirmed under the door, grabbing at our ankles. We heard the car door open and slam shut, Kevin came running out to help.

“No! Kevin stay back.” We yelled together.  
“What? If I don’t help they’ll get in” Kevin took a step closer.  
“Kevin, they’re getting in anyway, we’re just stalling! There’s too many of them.”  
Kevin just stood there for a moment, maybe he was coming to realize just exactly what was about to happen. He recovered quickly and grabbed the shotgun out of his car. By now the opening was nearly large enough for them to crawl through and we were getting tired.  
“Damn it, alright go get by Kevin and get ready”  
“Alright, just tell us when.”  
“Yea I know, just hurry up, I can’t hold this much longer.” It only took a few seconds for Dakota to grab his gun and get to the back of the garage.  
“Alright we’re ready.”  
“Ok, when I say go I’m gunna let go of the door and run back to u. when I do that you two shoot anything that comes out at me”  
“Dude, they’re slow, you don’t have to worry about them catching you, this isn’t Dawn of the Dead.”  
“Well cover me anyway; I don’t want any of them grabbing me when I turn around.”  
“Yea we will.”  
“Alright, get ready, 3, 2, 1, go!”  
I turned and leapt from the door, scooping up my rifle when I hit the ground, the only time I had ever successfully executed a barrel roll. Flesh grazed my shoe as I jumped, but was quickly removed by one of two sharp bangs and a short moan.  
Aluminum and steel screeched as the door was ripped up with tremendous force. Some twenty infected were at the opening, half of them still getting off of the cement. Those standing started towards us.  
It felt like every action movie I had ever seen. The infected appeared to move in slow motion as they rushed at us, arms stretched out towards us, mouths gaping open, lusting for a taste of our flesh. The guns raised to our shoulders, our sight traveled down the barrel and towards the skull of the attackers. Our fingers were perched on the triggers, ready to fire. Every squeeze of the trigger was met with a subtle resistance followed by a satisfying clap of thunder and an empty shell spinning out of the barrel. A new shell was loaded into the barrel with the reassuring clunk of the pump sliding back down the barrel, followed by the sound of the previous occupant clanging against the cement floor.  
In a matter of seconds the floor was covered with the bodies of “dis”infected individuals and the long dead blood that may or may not have coursed through their veins. Gore splattered the walls and driveway, brain matter dangled off the wall, limbs littered the driveway, and a stray finger had gone right through my front windshield, I silently cursed to myself. The last of the spent shells clanged off the floor. Smoke trailed from the end of our guns. We stood there panting, weapons still at the ready, staring out into the empty street.  
With the immediate threat gone we lowered our guns and looked at each other. We silently nodded to each other and got into our cars. We didn’t need to say anything; we were all thinking the same thing.

I had just gotten into the car when Dakota asked, “dude, do you know that there’s a finger in the backseat of yur car?”  
“Yes, I know, what do you think caused the hole in the windshield?” I sighed.  
“Whoa! Sorry bro, just tryin to point it out, it’s not like I did it.” He didn’t realize it, but it actually was him.  
We backed out of Kevin’s driveway and into the street, driving away as fast as we could; we had about five more hours of day light and a lot to do.  
Our first stop was going to be a gas station. We planned on filling our tanks with gas then grabbing all the gas cans that were available, filling them up, and taking as many as we could with us. Unfortunately our cars had very little in the way of space, especially with all the bags of supplies we had thrown in. We needed a truck or SUV with enough space to fit all the gas cans we planned on taking. Fortunately, in Howell, that’s not hard to find, nearly every family had a truck or SUV, and we knew just who to call. Our friend Trevor, well mine and Dakota’s friend anyway, he’s trustworthy and a good friend, the kind of person we would want with us when the world came to an end.  
We left Kevin and amber at the gas station to fill the camaro with as much gas and food as they could fit into what little space was left and fill more gas cans until we could get back with the truck. Dakota and I drove down M-59, another quarter mile to Gulley Road; Trevor lived at the other end of Gulley, another 5 miles away.  
I sped down the road towards Trevor’s house, it was a dirt road littered with potholes which made the ride somewhat bumpy. As we raced down the road we could see the blurs of the few infected that had managed to make their way this far away from the city, already terrorizing homes and the people that still lived. It was a fast 5 miles, for me at least, my mind quickly wandered away from the road and was filled with thoughts of the situation at hand. Every possible horrible outcome swept through my mind accompanied by anger, fear, and sorrow.  
We reached Trevor’s subdivision, dozens of infected wandered across the lawns, there were many houses in this subdivision, but only a few had stopped to try to bust down the doors of houses with people still inside. Most of the others chased after us as we sped past, all could either see or hear us. Trevor’s house was mostly vacant of the infected, only two, and one seemed to be more interested in the meal waiting in the house than us. Dakota eliminated the walker interested in us while I took out the other.  
“Alright, I’ll go talk to Trevor, you just stay at the car and shoot anything that gets too close.” I said to Dakota.  
“Aight, I’ll have fun while you tell him to hurry the fuck up.”  
“Would you like me to add a very polite ‘bitch’ to that?”  
“No I want it to be mean, now get going, you’re wasting time.”  
“Right, just watch yur back, just cuz they’re slow doesn’t mean they can’t get behind you, it’s how the survivors always die in the movies.” I told him as I advanced on the front door. Dakota quickly spun around to check then resumed his statue-like stance facing outward to the rest of the houses.  
I walked onto the porch and approached the door. I knocked three times and said, “Hey Trevor it’s me open up!” as loud as I could without yelling. I waited a minute before the door began to open. Much to my surprise the door opened with the barrel of a gun pointed at my head.  
“Were you bitten?!”  
“No,” I replied, “now kindly get that gun out of my face.”  
“Sorry man, can’t be too sure ya know?”  
“Sure do. Anyway, me, Dakota, and a couple others are planning on getting out of here. We’re gathering as much stuff as we can then heading out, figured u might want in, plus yur SUV would be great to stash food and shit in.”  
“I dunno man, I was kinda thinkin about stayin here and waiting for it all to blow over. It’s not like there’s a lot out there, and all I’d havta do is board up the windows and doors and shot anything that comes within a hundred feet.”  
“Haven’t you ever seen a zombie movie!? That shit never works! Besides …”  
Dakota whistles at me, I turn to look. He points toward the direction we came from, a mob of infected are coming after us.  
“Ok look, we don’t have much time before we have to leave, there’s no way u have enough food to last the rest of this nightmare, and the city is bound to be swarming with the dead. So are u coming or not?”  
“… alright I’ll get my keys.”  
“You do that, I’ll grab all yur food and anything else I find that could be helpful.”  
After a few minutes we had gathered as much as we could before we heard gunshots from outside, so we decided it had to be enough, and left. We threw everything in the back of Trevor’s SUV, I hopped in my car, and we drove away.  
As we approached the gas station we had left Kevin and Amber at we noticed there were many more cars waiting to use the pumps. We were confident Kevin had filled all of the gas cans though so we weren’t worried. Driving up I noticed a small crowd sitting in the corner, with a red camaro in the middle. Kevin was standing between it and the crowd, waving his shotgun at them while holding back a severely pissed off Amber. We jumped out of our cars, guns pointing at the back of the crowd.  
“HEY!! BACK THE FUCK AWAY!!” we yelled at them.  
“Fuck you! This asshole took all the goddamn gas cans, now there’s none left for any of us,” yelled back a man with blood running down the left side of his face, from an open gash I had assumed was from the butt of Kevin’s gun.

“I said get the fuck back or I’ll blow yur fucking head off got me?!!” I was furious.  
“Fuck you!” he said just as Dakota shoved the barrel of his gun into the man’s mouth.  
“Now we told you to get the fuck away. Start moving or I’ll pull this trigger. That goes for all of you!”  
The crowd slowly walked away, mumbling curses and insults at us, but none went back to their cars, they just moved to a safe distance and stared at us.  
I looked at Trevor, “Alright you and Amber load up these cans into yur car, we’ll keep an eye on the assholes.” Trevor nodded.  
Trevor and Amber cautiously moved the cans from next to the camaro and into the back of Trevor’s car. The crowd just stood there, watching. It was terrifying, twenty-something angry survivors contemplating ways to steal our fuel, we could see the gears spinning by reading the expressions on their faces. I felt bad for Trevor and Amber; those infuriated eyes tracked their movements back and forth, from car to car.  
“AAAHHH!!” a woman shrieked in horror. Everyone had been so focused on us, and us on the crowd, it took a minute for someone to realize what had just happened.  
“Infected! Run!” was all we heard before everyone panicked and ran back to their cars, trampling others in the chaos.  
“Get in the cars we’re leaving!” I yelled.  
“But there’s only 3 gas cans left.” Trevor replied.  
“I said move!” I don’t really know why I was in such a rush. We couldn’t see anything, there were no infected in sight, everyone was running away, and the last three cans would have only taken a minute at the most to store in Trevor’s car. But maybe that was it, not being able to see what had caused the commotion and the many terrified survivors running around, any of whom could have used this distraction to steal our fuel, or worse kill us for everything we had.  
“But wait, where are we gunna go to?” asked Trevor. Everyone turned and stared at me.  
“Um … I don’t know.” I replied.  
Then Dakota interrupted, “hey I know a place we can go! Just follow me, I’ll drive there”  
“No you won’t” I said, “you’ll tell me the directions and I’ll drive there. It’s my car.”  
Dakota sighed “fine follow him.” The five of us quickly returned to our cars and drove off down the road.  
“Ok now turn left down Hacker.” Dakota paused for a moment. “Why won’t you ever let me drive?”  
“Boo hoo, it’s the friggin’ zombie apocalypse and it’s only been like, five hours. Besides, I had to watch my daughter turn right in front of my own eyes! I think I deserve to drive as long as I want!” I clenched my jaw.  
“Aaagh!” I slammed my foot down on the gas pedal and watched as the speedometer went from 55 to 70 and up until it hit 93 before removing my foot. I proceeded to mercilessly attack the steering wheel and dashboard with my fists, honking the horn 4 times in my assault. Dakota shifted slightly to the right while staring at me with what seemed to be a small amount of fear. As sad as I was at that moment I just felt too angry to squeeze out even a single tear, even though all I wanted to do was cry.  
“Um, you passed the turn.”  
“I don’t. Fucking. Care.” A few moments of complete silence followed, I was glad he hadn’t said anything more about what had happened; all I wanted to do was focus on the road.  
“Ok well we’re going to have to turn around then.”  
“I know.” I turned down the next road, turned into a driveway, and turned around. The others did the same and followed me down the right road.  
“Ok, now its gunna be a while before we have to turn again, you’ll be going straight for like twenty minutes.”  
“Where are we going exactly?” I asked.  
“Um it’s some barn out by my uncle’s house. It’s abandoned so no one’s gunna find us there! Then we can think of where to go from there.”  
“Unless the area’s infected, then we’re screwed.” I replied.  
“Dude why do u have to be so negative?” I glared at him. He shut up and looked forward.  
As we drove past the many houses we noticed less and less progression of the hordes of infected. At first the dead were scattered only a few smashing at doors or crawling through windows. It quickly got to the point where only a few houses were besieged by the infected and after only a few minutes they were completely gone. I was surprised, when we passed those houses I hadn’t heard any gunfire and my car is far from soundproof. However the more I thought about it I realized many people might not understand that these people aren’t living anymore, the knocking at their door isn’t a neighbor, and the person breaking through the window isn’t a burglar. I felt sorry for those people, terrified and eaten alive by friends and family without knowing what was happening, I prayed I would never have to experience such horror.

As we got closer to the next turn the landscape started to shift from urban homes to farmland. All I could think of was what could be waiting within each cornfield or the forests beyond. Maybe Dakota was right, I am being too negative, but maybe me being negative would keep me alive, maybe I should start thinking more about our future and less on pointless questions.  
“Alright, you’re gunna turn right down Burin Road; it won’t be much farther after that.”  
“Good I’m getting tired of waiting. We need to plan things out.” a minute later we turned down Burin and the rest of the drive was silent until we reached the barn.  
We all pulled up to the barn doors. The place looked terrible. Most of the old red paint had peeled off or faded away and what little remained was cracked, covered in mold and dirt, and faded to a duller and darker color. Many boards had broken or came loose, some were missing entirely, and all were a creepy greenish grey color from years of sunlight, mold, and termite damage. Even the roof had a slight depression to it and one of the corners looked like it was ready to fall in. The only stable parts of the structure seemed to be the large doors that were nearly a foot thick and the giant wooden beams holding the entire thing up.  
We all jumped out of our vehicles, scanned the surrounding area, and found nothing out of place so we walked up to the closed doors.  
I started giving orders, “ok, Kevin go around to the side and look through one of the holes, check if it’s empty.”  
“Alright.”  
“Trevor, you and me will open these doors, you take the right I’ll grab the left and Dakota will stand in the middle just in case it’s not empty.”  
“Yessir capi-tan!” replied Trevor.  
“I’ll grab my gun.” Said Dakota.  
“Kevin, see anything?” I yelled as quietly as I could.  
“Nope, can’t hear anything either.”  
“Alright, on the count of three we go in. One. Two. Three!” Trevor and I slowly pushed open the heavy doors. The rusty hinges creaked and groaned as the doors moved for the first time in years.  
“Shit! I wasn’t ready!” yelled Dakota.  
“Wait, what!?” I looked back to see Dakota still fumbling through the car to find a weapon. Just then we heard movement in the hay and on the floor above us.  
Everyone yelled, “Oh shit!” in unison. Trevor and I leaped back from the doors. Dakota ran forward with an ice scraper in-hand. Kevin jumped around the corner holding a broken off 2x4. We could hear them running at us through the hay. We stood there waiting for them to pop out at us. Then, all of a sudden, the two squirrels leapt from underneath the hay and ran right through our legs.

“Oh my God, it was just a couple of stupid squirrels.” I said panting, one hand over my chest, “that nearly gave me a heart attack.”  
“Shoulda shot ‘em anyway”  
“With what Dakota, an ice scraper?” I replied.  
“Yea dude what’s up with that, you gunna scratch them to death?”  
“Shut up Trevor.”  
“Hey man, I’m just sayin.”  
“Ok let’s focus here, we need to clear this place out and set up for the night.” We spent the next few hours clearing out all of the hay and setting up camp for the night. We moved the hay to just outside the door and spread some around the building to make it easier to hear for anything approaching. I built a fire in the middle of the floor, after the hay had been removed, while the others unpacked food, sleeping bags, and an assortment of other things. After the fire was going we set up a hanging pot to cook us dinner.  
“Ok what’s for dinner?” Dakota asked.  
“Well what do we have that needs to be eaten soon or it’ll spoil” I replied.  
“Well we have some bacon, veggies, and cheese that should probably be used soon.”  
“Why do we have bacon and cheese, that just doesn’t seem … you know what never mind just throw it in the pot with a can of soup or water or something.” I said.  
“But shouldn’t we cook the bacon first?” asked Dakota.  
“Sure, just throw it in the pot, let it cook for a while, then throw in the rest.”  
“Alright I’m on it.”  
“Trevor, amber, we might as well help and start cutting up the vegetables. Kevin, go grab some more firewood before it gets too dark.”  
“Where am I gunna get firewood?”  
I waved my arms, motioning all around us, “look around, there are trees outside, there’s probably some dead branches lying around, and we’re sitting in a wooden barn that’s falling apart, there’s wood everywhere.”  
“Alright, I’ll be back in a bit.” Kevin grabbed his gun and walked outside. The rest of us continued with what we were doing. A few minutes later and the bacon was done, the vegetables were diced up, and we had a sizeable pile of wood next to the fire, all that was left was emptying a can of soup into the pot.  
“Ok does anyone have a can opener?” I asked.  
We looked around at each other, “no one?”  
“Well, we can try using a knife.” Suggested Dakota.  
“Alright let’s try that.” I replied.  
Dakota grabbed a knife, plunged it into the lid of the can, and started sawing away at it. The aluminum groaned as the steel knife broke it apart.  
“This is not as easy as I thought it was.”  
“Well yea nothings as easy as it looks on TV.” replied Trevor. Dakota eventually managed to pry open the can and poured the contents into the pot. The rest of the food followed it in along with an extra helping of water to fill up the pot. Dakota stirred the soup while the rest of us grabbed bowls and spoons. Kevin and Amber sat away from the fire leaning against one of the large wooden beams holding up the barn. They talked to each other while waiting for the food; I don’t know what they were talking about, it wasn’t my business to know. Trevor, Dakota, and I sat by the fire. Dakota and Trevor were talking about the food and the infection, contemplating on how it could have happened. I just sat there staring into the fire, not thinking about anything in particular, and giving my opinion when the others asked me about their conversation.  
Dakota called us over when the food was done. “Who’s hungry!? Careful though, it’s hot.” At the sound of food we all stopped what we were doing and stood next to the pot of boiling liquid hovering over the fire with bowls in hand waiting for our turn to pour steaming hot food into them. We all sat down around the fire slurping up the soup, it tasted great.  
Amber quickly gulped down a large spoonful just before yelping, “Owowowowow! Oh my god that’s really hot!!”  
“Yea, he just said that babe. Here drink some water and blow on it next time” Kevin said while chuckling. We all had a small laugh.  
“Wow, this is really good, a lot better than I thought it would be.” I said.  
“Well I am an amazing cook.” Replied Dakota.  
“Dude all you did was throw food and water in a pot and let it boil.” Said Trevor.  
“Shut up Trevor, I’m a great cook and you know it.” We all laughed.  
We finished the soup fairly quickly, there wasn’t a drop left in the pot. After the food was gone everyone resumed talking to each other while setting up the area to sleep. We laid out our sleeping bags, or in Dakota’s case a tent, and cleared the wood and dishes from the area around the fire. With everyone getting tired the only thing left to do now was set up a watch schedule.

“Alright guys before we all fall asleep we need to have someone staying up to keep watch. Now with the five of us I say we each take a turn every two hours or so, I’ll take first watch.” I said.  
“I call last watch.” blurted out Dakota.  
“Of course you do, who’s going second?”  
“I’ll take second.”  
“Ok, Kevin’s after me, Trevor, amber, which one of you wants to go after Kevin?”  
“I’ll do it.”  
“Ok Trevor’s after Kevin, amber you good with that?”  
“Yea, I don’t care, I’ll go after him.”  
“Ok good, well get some sleep guys, tomorrow’s gunna be a long day.”  
Everyone crawled into their sleeping bags. Dakota and Trevor fell asleep immediately, Kevin and amber stayed up for a few minutes talking about their family before doing the same. I was left alone now with only a fire to keep me warm and my thoughts to keep me occupied. Most of my thoughts were unwelcome invaders in my mind. I couldn’t stop thinking about my daughter. Every other thought was about what would happen if I found her, would I have to kill her, would I even be able to do it? I was so focused on my thoughts, mostly trying to suppress them, that all I was able to do was feed wood to the fire and check my watch for the time every five minutes. The rest of my time was very uneventful consisting mostly of the tossing and snoring of my friends and the crackling of the fire, although I did see the two squirrels from earlier but they quickly ran away again.  
Two hours later I woke up Kevin. “Hey” I said shaking his shoulder, “wake up, it’s your turn.”  
“Mmmnm” Kevin groaned, “alright gimme a second.” Kevin rubbed his eyes, stood up, and stretched.  
“Ok, that was the worst two hours of sleep ever. Where’s the water?”  
“here.” I handed him a bottle of water from my bag.  
Kevin took a big swig. “Ah, that’s better. Alright I got it from here. You good?”  
“Yup, guess I’ll try to fall asleep.” I laid down in my sleeping bag. I tried closing my eyes but I just couldn’t fall asleep so just laid there, eyes open, thinking about nothing for what felt like an hour before eventually passing out.


End file.
